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B&Q Unloved Gardens feedback thread. Non-testers: add your unloved garden comments - £150 voucher to be won NOW CLOSED

586 replies

AngelieMumsnet · 10/07/2013 12:20

This thread is for the 20 Mumsnetters who have been chosen by B&Q to revamp their unloved garden.

Those selected have been sent a B&Q giftcard to buy the things they need to give their unloved garden a makeover. They're working to complete the makeover by the 28th, and will be keeping us up-to-date on how their revamps are going on this thread as well as posting photos.

Please do follow their stories and add your own comments if you want to show some support!

Below are the questions we'd like testers to answer but please feel free to add your own comments too. Please give us a bit of info about the garden you're revamping and what you plan to do with it in your response.

  • Why is your unloved garden unloved? What do you want to change about it? What has stopped you until now?
  • Where did you get your inspiration for doing up the garden from? What sort of style are you going for etc?
  • Have you had much help along the way with the revamp? If so, who from? And what sort of help - practical or ideas-based?
  • How did you find your shopping experience at B&Q? Were the staff helpful? Did you find anything in store you maybe didn't expect to beforehand?
  • Did you use any of the help and advice that B&Q offer? This includes their videos on YouTube, leaflets and classes in store etc. If so, how useful was that help and advice?
  • If B&Q could do anything more to help you next time you visit, what would it be?
  • Have you had any feedback on what you've done with the garden from family/friends? Has the transformation had a big impact on you and/or your family?

If you're not an official tester but would like to be in with a chance of winning a £150 B&Q giftcard, please post on this thread to tell us about your own garden revamp successes (or failures!) - we'd love to hear from all MNers who have a garden makeover story to share!

Thanks very much
MNHQ

OP posts:
Cremolafoam · 18/07/2013 21:56

Ps lissyloo I am aching from bending and digging. Stuff the gym. Gardening is the new Zumba!Grin

DoingItOurSelves · 18/07/2013 22:06

Big downer here. It turns out that spending lots of time consulting and listening to B+Q staff, then shopping, then loading, then going over to their build department and spending ages signing up for B +Q club wasn't so smart after all. Sad

Watford B+Q carpark has a two hour time limit to do everything in, including for disabled drivers, and I was so busy finding the entrance (a hard right off a one way system) I didn't spot the notice.

I've received a parking charge from Parking Eye for £100!

Cremolafoam · 18/07/2013 22:21

Oh DIOS that is horrendous . I'm very sorry indeed to hear that. Shock
Surely there must be recourse with the parking company. ? I do hope so

sharond101 · 18/07/2013 22:37

We moved into a new property in December and spent the first six months with the back blinds down because the much heap was too unbearable. Now though it's a beautiful piece of work with patio, lawn and flowers. I even bought DH a bird table for his birthday.

OpheliaBumps · 18/07/2013 22:38

doing google parking eye fines, I'm sure if you ignore it nothing will happen, you might get a threatening letter but they won't take you to court. Have a search on here, and Money Saving Expert, for advice, but don't pay it!

DoingItOurSelves · 18/07/2013 22:48

Cremola it shows a photo of me with my badge displayed, and says I can use their appeal and complaints procedure which sounds perfectly reasonable, but the owner of the vehicle (who kindly lent it to me) says if I do I'm acknowledging a debt to them, and they then will be able to enforce it against him as the registered keeper.
Ophelia I will, thanks.

SmellsLikeWeenSpirits · 18/07/2013 22:55

Nooooo Doing that's a bloody outrage. Do not pay it. But even the hassle of fighting - you just don't bloody need it. What a massive pain on the arse

I've just seen my appalling typos. Sorry I'm so incomprehensible. I've not really got a defence other than my fat fingers and aching shoulders. If I've still got bingo wings at the end of this ill have to accept they're terminal

DoingItOurSelves · 18/07/2013 23:31

WeenSpirits it certainly wiped the grin of my face.

Wonders idly if B+Q would like me as a legitimate customer with a legitimate reason to take longer to manage to shop in two separate stores (a stroll across a car park for many but a major use of arm power for me) to road test their car park enforcers appeals service?
For the cost of the fine if we lose, I?m all theirs.

Roma2013 · 19/07/2013 07:49

To summarise, B&Q, if you're monitoring this thread, some conclusions to date are:

  1. Your instore/online ordering system needs an overhaul. There are inconsistencies and customers can get rather frustrated being told one thing then another, of being sent 'around the houses' by different staff. This relates to 2.
  1. Staff have huge variations in knowledge. I don't think it's their fault. One staff member explained this to me as being because there are so many different promotions. The tills don't often register the promotion at the checkout. even if you rely on part-time, casual labour you need a better system of ensuring staff can access quickly and readily information.
  1. Your online reserving system is clunky. It allowed me to reserve 3 tins of paint when there was only two in store to collect. Now, someone DID. phone me up and let me know that the third wasn't available so checks are being made. However, in this technological age we live in, your systems should be able to check stock instantly and transmit that information to the reserving customer at point of online Reserve. Everything gets scanned through the tills I presume so it would be possible. Out of interest, I looked again two days later at the paint stock reservation online. It was still showing 'available'. Now it might be the case that you've had more stock in but I don't think I d chance driving a full hour's round trip in case it was just that your system's takes forever to update.
  1. It appears that good customer service at B&Q is hugely variable. Some of us have been lucky enough to meet with very pleasant, helpful individual staff. Others haven't. This mediates your PR. You need to sort it. Similarly, whether or not a customer can find someone to help is also pot-luck. The stores are so big that you can wander around for a long time searching for someone in an orange uniform. Staff on the ground also get frustrated at sometimes not to be able to contact a manager. One assistant I dealt with rang for 20 mins to authorise my price reduction. He couldn't get hold of a single manager. Very poor. Very frustrating for us both.
  1. Please do not shelve absolute responsibility for parking to Parking Eye (where this applies). Whether you know this or not, customers just think 'B&Q' when they have parking restrictions/fines. This affects YOUR PR! Incidentally, until you get around to sorting this, a 'gesture of goodwill' might be in keeping for the poster below who fell foul of a somewhat ridiculous 2 hr parking limit. Given your lack of staff on the ground, their variable knowledges and the size of your stores, it is not unreasonable to spend more time than this (some stores have cafes serving lunch).
  1. There are some things that I love about B&Q - your wide selection of house DIY products (though stock availability is variable). I have to say though (and it depends what this Gardens survey is for...) but at MY local stores, the Gardening section could be vastly improved. Plants need attending daily so they look in tiptop condition. They are often crowded together too much and randomly priced. If no price label is attached, and no staff around to ask, customers will just not buy it. This is especially the case with gardening products. People walk and browse in this dept because it is a nice thing to do (that's why Garden Centres and Parks exist). They often buy on the spur of the moment. Impulse purchase. They won't if they gave to disentangle a thirsty looking unpriced plant from its neighbours. Also check the condition of your pots. Many are chipped or broken at the base. Not a good impression as customers may attribute this to not being weather proof.

I am sure others will come along with more ideas. You could be 'brilliant' you know...

Geeklover · 19/07/2013 10:44

I've got some more pics to upload later when I'm on my computer.
I've totally changed my mind about where I'm putting the decking.
Exdh has been helping this morning and pulled out a massive bush of weeds that appeared from nowhere and now it's cleared I measure the space it sits between my house and the neighbours outbuilding thing and my decking will be a nice fit.
The way I get the sun means that it'll be just as nice a spot as the original plan and will actually make more sense because of the nice fit.
So exh had been despatch ex to buy some tools to get that but dug up and evened off.
Wish me luck Grin it's me that's doing it.

DoingItOurSelves · 19/07/2013 11:23

Good luck Geeklover!
Roma, tbh it isn't just restrictions/fines, the car park appears to be entirely B+Q's property, (apart from a food van) it wasn't visibly a private operation at all. Even with hindsight it still looks very much like it?s all down to B+Q and belongs to them.
You enter down an unlikely small road off a major route, having managed not to get rear ended braking for it, (the sign is at the beginning apparently) and go down it thinking it must be wrong, before it opens out and you?re hit by Orange signage everywhere with two very large B+Q buildings with large external displays, and parking and trolleys, in the centre between the two stores. One is on the left and one on the right, visually joined up by a pedestrian corridor of B+Q products. There?s no visible other businesses there.

It seems I am road testing the system for them anyway, so:

It appears from the letter there is a sign (as you turn off the one way system) and they say there is signage throughout the car park.

I called the store to ask if this sign we missed said anything about concessions for disabled drivers, and they said the only sign they knew about was when you enter but they couldn't go and look because it's out near the entrance, off the road, not in the car park, and they don't know where any in the car park or near the buildings are, and are short staffed today.

I tried calling Parking eye to see if they knew what their sign said, but the phone number is automated messages only.

So I phoned B+Q customer services who said it is their landlords who have this arrangement with Parking Eye, not them, but if i could find the receipt I could go back to the store and they could request cancellation for me, and if I couldn't find the receipt then the store might be able to trace the purchases made that day by going through the computer system. (Would all this take less than two hours parked up, I wonder?)
She did however come up with another phone number for Parking Eye, so I phoned it.

I told them sorry I didn't wish to give the notice number or my details, just for them to please check if there was any concession for disabled drivers and loading time at this car park. They initially told me B+Q owned the site and it was up to them how long I got, they just enforced it for them, but when I said that wasn't correct, they said it was indeed an independent landlord and no there was no extra time for disabled drivers.
I said if I'd known that, I'd have done one store, chucked my chair in the van, and driven out and round the block, got the chair back out and done the other store.

Apparently you will also be fined £100 if you re-enter the car park within three hours so beware, if you've forgoton something, don't 'pop' back, without reading their the car park rules carefully.

At this point after asking an awful lot of questions politely, and asking if photo's of a lot of B+Q products would do in lieu of a receipt, if I couldn't find it, and mentioning that everyone in store would have been very aware of woman in wheelchair with large amounts of stuff, she said that actually the manager of the store (must be the manager, not a deputy) can just phone them and ask for it to be cancelled!
She did then offer if I gave details, to freeze action on the charge for ten days while I sorted it out, but I declined explaining I didn?t wish to do anything that implied I?d entered any contract with them.

So you know what I'm off to do next.... (instead of doing the work I need to be doing)

DoingItOurSelves · 19/07/2013 11:56

I've called and had to explain why I need to contact him, and left my number, so hopefully it will all get resolved easily enough.
The staff member I spoke to knew about the time restriction as has to have a staff arrangement for their own car because of it, but wasn't aware of the return restrictions on customers, and thanked me for drawing it to their attention.
We've lost the morning so better crack on.

Cremolafoam · 19/07/2013 12:56

Ween can I ask you how you marked out your path? I will being doing a similarly shaped one soon. ( without dino teeth Grin)Did you do it freehand or mathematically with string and posts and braininess?
looks really good

SmellsLikeWeenSpirits · 19/07/2013 13:35

Hi Cremola, we tried doing ot with a bit of string and one of us at one end so it was like a compass, but it didn't work

so in the end we did it by eye. we went a along with one of those crecent shaped cutting things for doing the edges of lawns and sliced a bit in shaving a bit here and there to make it right. then i got a stick and cut it to the width of the path and moved it a long marking every now and then to keep it even(ish)

hang on i'll find a photo of it now....

SmellsLikeWeenSpirits · 19/07/2013 13:36

our lovely friend came and did teh paving for us yesterday, i am thrilled, he's done a great job and it makes such a difference

SmellsLikeWeenSpirits · 19/07/2013 13:49

stay strong Doing Grin

i spent my last £30 odd on plants yesterday, i bought a hydrangea, because it looked beautiful,(see Roma's point about impulse buys Grin) i had planned to put it in the weed bed in front of the bay window, but i need to check how big it'll grow first.

i am a bit cross, i bought two trays of strawberry plants specifically because they were reduced, and i've just looked at the receipt and they've not reduced them at the till Angry only a saving of £4.50 so not worth making the 40 mile round trip from home to compain, but i didn't really need them, we already have a few .

i have a bit of a dilemma. i had intended doing a bed up each side of the path, i wanted a little box hedge in it, but a) cutting a bed each side will reduce the size of the lawn left each side to postage stamp proportions. not sure this matters but i don't want a monumental PATH and nothing else. or do i? Hmm

secondly i priced up box plants and i think it's going to cost £70 to do the lot which is too much.

i toyed with planting something else....but what? i don't do bedding plants, can't be arsed with replanting. i don't want to just create another space for weeds and that will need maintenance . that part is on hold for now.

SmellsLikeWeenSpirits · 19/07/2013 13:50

good luck Geeklover i've changed our plans a few times, it's not until you get stuck in that it starts fitting together (or not) i find

SmellsLikeWeenSpirits · 19/07/2013 13:58

can i ask what you think of b&q products? i don't want to be negative when they've given me free stuff but overall i'm not hugely impressed with the quality or prices.

the gravel i ordered is meant to be 20mm. there must be about 4 pieces per tonne that are actually 20mm, the rest are teeny weeny, and it is filthy, i mean really really filthy. i had a friend over last night who works in the concrete industry and he was really interested in it, because it was so very dirty and of such odd composition. he actually took a sample and washed it and studied it and declared it very odd indeed. i'm sure it'll look fine when it's down and washed by the rain, but again in each tonne there must be a significant proportion that is just dust, and people (not me obvs) are paying for that dust.

i could have got a far superior product, for the same cost from a local supplier, and of course if you can do that you propbably will.

Roma2013 · 19/07/2013 14:19

Yay! Today someone offered me a shed for £30 if I dismantle it myself so I will need to see if B&Q have a 'Can Do' videos to re-erect it again. I have been trying to take it this morning. I will buy some paint from B&Q to make it fit with our renovated yard though won't get around to painting it till after the deadline. Have taken the roof off so far... Not as hard as I thought...

lissieloo · 19/07/2013 16:06

Doing, that's appalling! I second not paying. Isn't there a company that runs parking scams on shop carparks?

Ween, I've found it ok, tbh, but the bulk of mine went on wood and tools. I could have done it cheaper elsewhere though. That said, If my BFF hadn't told me about the longevity of the tiles, I would have bought them instead of boards. B&Q should state the cons of different options as well as the pros.
Could you plant greenery or bulbs (they come back each year and you can get loads from poundland) Love the path!

Roma, you jammy bugger! I'd love a shed.

Today has been less stressy, my joints are v sore after yesterdays digathon so I just painted the other fence and tried to sort out some family stuff. My neighbour is going to paint his fence the same colour. I've done our side of the joint fence, its a low fence so the kids play across it. I feel very proud.

Cremolafoam · 19/07/2013 16:20

Roma that's brilliant about the shed! Bargain!
Ween thanks - thats good advice re path. I am doing lavender on either side of mine. maybe that would work for you.

lissieloo · 19/07/2013 16:22

oooh, I love lavender

Roma2013 · 19/07/2013 18:50

Now I have somewhere to put our bikes and tools so am v pleased about the shed. I am workong virtually every day on this project but it's taking SUCH a long time to come together. Am feeling I' m lagging behind the rest of you hugely!

TallulahTT · 19/07/2013 19:54

Before my daughters hard work

TallulahTT · 19/07/2013 19:55

And after